Hiring for Good is a podcast exploring the transformative power of leadership and what happens when the right person takes the job. Thank you for tuning in to this episode with our guest Dr. Randall Kinnison, aka Doctor Peace.
Dr. Randall Kinnison founded Genesis Mediation in 2005. His mission was simple – create peace. Since that beginning, Randy and the Genesis Team have created peace for thousands of people. His vision is to create peace for over 3 million people by 2030.
Hiring For Good Website: https://www.hiringforgoodpod.com/
Dr. Randall Kinnison’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/randykinnison/
Genesis Mediation: https://genesismediation.com/
Tanis Morris: Director of Business Development at Acumen Executive Search Email: tanis@acumenexecutivesearch.com
Suzanne Hanifin: President at Acumen Executive Search Email: suzanne@acumenexecutivesearch.com
Acumen Executive Search Website: https://www.acumenexecutivesearch.com/
Acumen Executive Search is the leading certified woman-owned Executive Search and advisory Firm on the West Coast.
Hiring for Good Transcript
0:00 good morning uh I am Tanis Morris with Acumen executive Search and Hiring for
0:05 Good podcast and per usual I’m joined by my lovely co-worker and friend Suzanne
0:11 Hanifin well thank you Tanis good morning and uh today we have a special guest with us here um we are honored to
0:18 welcome Dr Randall Kinnison an entrepreneur thought leader and organizational leader known by the
0:24 moniker Dr Peace which is an apt name as his mission is to create more peace in
0:30 the world it also happens to be the name of just one of the companies he has founded and led..and leads currently um
0:37 after his first career as a pastor came to a close Randy founded Genesis Mediation in
0:43 2005 uh this initial endeavor grew to become the four companies operating
0:49 under the Genesis Brand which are dedicated to creating peace in the lives of others at home at work and in the
0:55 communities they serve in 2019 Randy expanded the Genesis vision and founded the aforementioned Dr Peace an
1:03 initiative through which he helps to..or he plans to help over 3 million people worldwide experience more peace by 2030
1:11 in addition to his business leadership, Dr Kinnison is a dedicated Community member who volunteers uh with causes and
1:18 organizations he believes in he’s currently chairman of the board for the Union Gospel Mission of Portland Randy
1:24 it’s a pleasure and honor to have you with us on Hiring for Good today welcome thank you so much my mother would be
1:30 really proud of that intro it’s always fun to hear all of your accolades and accomplishments listed out and you have
1:36 many um we’ve been really excited to welcome you uh today we’re actually
1:42 going to be talking quite a bit about business transitions and um the reason we wanted to have you here with us is
1:49 you really uh operate in that world but if you don’t mind giving our audience a little bit about kind of your background
1:55 and journey and how you came to this work we we’d love to hear it sure uh it’s been an interesting journey uh I’ve
2:02 always enjoyed families uh so and the reason that it’s kind of deep seated I remember when I was a third grader and
2:09 my parents came and sat me down and said we’re going to get a divorce and that just totally I went from playing with my
2:16 friends to like wow I’m now in a broken family and that impacted me I didn’t
2:22 have a model of what I mean I wasn’t abused I mean don’t get me wrong it wasn’t like that but it just my world
2:28 kind of fractured right and that impacted me because as I grew up I first wanted to be a neurologist and so I was
2:35 premed most of my career until I shifted and as I became faith based then I
2:40 wanted to really help families and so I’ve got like you know a lot of Behavioral Health background and degrees
2:46 to to work on families and couples in marriage and so I’ve been to celebrated
2:52 my 48th wedding anniversary with my wife we had five kids 12 grandkids we’ve had 24 foster babies go through our home and
2:59 so family’s been a real theme in my life so as I approached business as a mediator and looked at how do I help
3:07 bring business at work so I founded an HR company because what a novel idea to have piece at work right and so I did a
3:15 pilot with that pilot seem to work you give me three years and I can help shift a culture uh but it all begins with
3:21 leadership and how to grow leaders right which you ladies all know and so uh but
3:26 that fascinated me and I really enjoyed doing that so as I did more that I started working in the transition space
3:31 and especially with family businesses I’ve helped other businesses you know key employees and others but I really
3:37 enjoy working with families uh because I’m the one who helps settle things down
3:42 right the family business doesn’t go south because the attorney didn’t write up the shareholder agreement properly
3:48 right it’s because of the family dynamics they’re tricky they can be hard right and the more generations you go
3:53 down the trickier it gets right as you get cousins and all those different influences and you understand family
4:00 systems and you know how that just explodes so that’s uh really why I’m
4:05 settled into what I’m in what I call my uh kind of my what I call semi-retirement now so I’m I’ve shed
4:12 some companies sold some and now I’m focusing primarily on this helping people with business transitions and
4:18 bumps along the road and as well as a nuke startup really I have is honor my parent honor your parent with the book I
4:25 wrote and I’m working on that which I hope will impact a number of people and then do you mind if I just quickly ask
4:31 you to expand on what what you mean by business transitions I I realized I didn’t introduce that myself but do you
4:38 mind just kind of sure uh I work in the space primarily with with going from
4:44 First-generation to second-generation which is always interesting um and then second-generation to third-generation
4:50 okay so the failure rate between a first-generation and second-generation is 70%
4:56 so when a parent founds a company and then their child takes over to run the company would be a first a first first-
5:03 generational right and then it’s not just maybe that child that’s taking it over um but the siblings right what
5:10 positions do they have are they going to be like on a board are they going to have parts in the company uh how will
5:15 they interact with existing employees all that gets really interesting uh then you go from second to third gets even
5:23 more interesting uh because at that point now you’re usually in the third generation you’re thinking about cousins
5:30 right right and and that can get very interesting as well so all those
5:35 dynamics are important to tie together and I think we’re going to talk about values in a minute but values I found
5:42 are the absolute glue that brings that keeps that family business together and
5:48 families together as well well and and I’ll expand that because I really think it’s the values that keep any business
5:56 glued together and it’s the alignment of those values and goals and sure yeah
6:03 working towards towards those I think what a lot of you know parents of family
6:09 businesses don’t understand is the importance of raising their children is
6:14 actually as important or more important than the business principles they teach wow and I think a lot of parents don’t
6:21 don’t think about that as such a key important role that they play in family business it’s not just the business
6:28 skills and acumen they learn it’s are the values they’re teaching as a family
6:34 are those being transmitted like if there if hard work is a value is that being transmitted are their kids
6:40 learning the value of hard work and what does that look like for them in the context of that family business and
6:46 that’s a tough place to be in because usually you’re coming in at that transition you’re not coming in when the
6:53 children are younger and learning this stuff so it is there a lot of like
6:59 relearning and re-education that needs to go on uh you you can do what you can
7:05 do uh but it’s really difficult uh what you want to do though is help that generation who’s just emerging as
7:13 parents the importance of what it means to be a parent it’s obviously they they’ve already experienced a parenting
7:19 that they received from their parents but what did they learn what did they like from that what would they want to
7:25 change what would what’s important for them as they think about their own parenting and what kind of values are
7:31 they going to pass on that they received and do they how do they tweak those or how do they change those and how do they
7:36 make them uh more what they want them and the importance that they have as as values right absolutely and and so
7:44 through this journey you talked about one incredibly formative experience which is your parents divorce what other
7:53 formative experiences or a mentor that you had that really shaped Who You Are
8:00 and what these values you bring to the table I’ve always sought out mentors I
8:05 believe mentors are play incredibly important role uh jron says you’re the average of the five people that you hang
8:11 around with most right so the key is like how are you going to find those five people and how will you allow them
8:17 to influence you right um so but I’ve always s at least one or two on an
8:22 ongoing basis and I just remember uh one as an early as a young pastor I sought
8:27 out an older pastor to be I was like 23 years old when I be I started as a leader I had staff under me you know
8:33 which is unusual as a brand new minted pastor and so I went I went to him and I
8:39 was late okay I was like five minutes late because I like to squeeze out every little mm last drop of something before I
8:45 go to the next thing right and so the first time he let it slide I did it again the second time I was late because
8:52 this was my pattern right and he said and I’ll never forget these words said
8:57 Randy when do you think your time time is more important than my time and wow it’s like just hit me like a ton of
9:04 bricks and you know that totally changed how I appre..how I looked at time not
9:10 only my time but how I was affecting other people around me whether it was my wife my kids um one of the things I
9:16 started doing is having daddy dates with my with my kids you know I just started looking at time differently and not so
9:23 you know egocentric but more like how is it affecting everybody around me my staff everybody and that one comment
9:31 really impacted my my life you know so that’s that’s one um other times um you
9:38 know some of the mentors when I first got into being a business owner it was a real shift from being a pastor right and
9:45 so I had three business owners who are highly successful that had breakfast every Friday morning and I asked I did
9:51 uh I helped one of them in their family business and so I asked him hey could I join your your little Breakfast Club and
9:57 he said sure and it was just really interesting and helpful for me to hear them talk about you know not only
10:06 business but family too you know talking about raising kids when they your kids know you can buy them anything they want
10:12 and knowing that I’m not going to give that to you just because you want it you know and so sometimes there’s that
10:19 challenge of you know not being able to provide for your kids there’s that other opposite end of it for those people with
10:25 higher wealth of saying how do we raise our kids and help him to be responsible
10:30 and respectful and not feel entitled right it’s it’s not as easy as people might think oh absolutely and so as
10:38 we’re really talking about transitions and successions how on Earth did you
10:44 transition from being a pastor to a business owner you talk about a different mindset a different set of
10:51 goals what what I realize so on the Clifton Strength Finder I’m sure you’re
10:57 familiar with that I I’m one of my number one things is an activator so like I like to start things and so I
11:04 didn’t realize how much of a serial entrepreneur I was until I was kind of unleashed um so actually it felt like
11:11 the the kind of the floor or excuse me the ceiling was taken off and I could
11:17 kind of be whatever God had for me to be and I it was just a t..a ton of fun so uh
11:24 my wife was a little scared at times you know but she reined me in but it was uh you
11:31 know I had to think understand business world a little more but as I was still lead so as a pastor so I had to
11:37 understand how to read spreadsheets how to how to you know balance budgets how to lead my staff how to help grow my
11:43 staff so a lot of those principles are the same in the nonprofit world or the for-profit world a lot of those dynamics
11:50 and you ladies know that of course are are very similar um it’s just uh is it a
11:56 that usually the mission is a little bit different but with uh to me my mission
12:03 in my for-profit is not much different than if it was a nonprofit yeah tell you the truth you know and I’ve thought
12:08 about becoming you know a benefit company because it’s I I think it’s really interesting you know I also was
12:14 raised in the church and I’ve thought often about um just formative lessons
12:20 that I personally received from that background um I know that one of the
12:27 things that I that really was meaningful to me was early on talking about like to
12:33 experience success in life or with others or on a team the number one quality you’re called to have and this
12:39 was from a pastor it was having a servant heart so I think that that terminology might be a little bit
12:44 different in the business world but the ethos is not far off because I I also
12:50 you know on hiring for good we are interviewing leaders of successful leaders of organizations and I often
12:58 think most of the you know the quality I would most say is required of a successful
13:05 leader is generosity it’s the desire to like serve and uplift others first so
13:11 that was a lot of me let me ask you well it’s an interesting um concept because I
13:18 would say humility is is probably one of the the
13:23 number one attributes I think a good leader has and it’s approaching things
13:30 of not saying it’s my way or the highway but really that humility of saying you
13:36 know better yeah or let’s listen to Randy and his advice and well and that’s
13:42 another value I mean like uh when my kids were little we had this book called The Book of Values and it was basically
13:48 the authors had compiled um qualities or characteristics
13:54 that were congruent across all of the great religions of the world and so humility is one generosity is one you
14:01 it’s really interesting so I think um there sometimes it’s it’s not too different but um what a good segue
14:08 values ask you about your values so that that is our next question you know we were curious to know what are the values
14:17 that that you hold most dear that that are most formative to kind of your being
14:23 and then how do you instill those into the organizations you lead and then you know beyond that into the the world at
14:28 large yeah um so even when I was young I
14:34 developed a personal mission statement you know my vision and my values so
14:39 these have been with me since I was in my 20s wow so one of them is learn so I
14:45 believe in lifelong learner I I’ll talk about how I instill those in just a minute but learn um so that concept is
14:52 is if you can learn 1% every day right then after the end of a year you’ve
14:57 learned an awful lot right and so like in my journal every day in my journal I one of my thoughts is I have a gratitude
15:04 thought and I have what did I learn today every day you know what did I learn today I think that’s just so
15:10 helpful to be so I’m constantly listening to podcasts reading you know listening you know I I love to learn and
15:15 that’s why I developed even a learn club instead of a book club because let’s talk about how we learn uh it’s
15:21 fascinating um serve it’s another one so how are we serving um so I want uh as an
15:28 organization we served others we did micro investing I think micro investing is one of the most key things you can do
15:33 to help other people um and it’s shown how how it’s really actually good good
15:39 wealth building it’s actually people repay those loans better than they pay larger loans uh so you know uh the idea
15:47 of of serving is important you know how do we how are we serving others and I’ve
15:52 always tried to model that in my life and what I’ve been doing um giving you know often what do we give toward what
15:59 do we what does that look like and how do we do it as a company as well right
16:04 and then the you know the last one is collaboration um so that’s deep in me
16:10 that’s one of the reasons why I joined the group provisors to tell you the truth is because there was a lot of opportunity to collaborate I I formed my
16:18 own office complex because I wanted to collaborate with other professionals so when people walked in the door we could
16:24 help probably solve anything they came through the door with so we have attorneys and therapists and financial
16:29 people and it was a lot of fun to create that community uh so that was important
16:35 to me as well so it’s to me it’s a critical you don’t really have values unless people can see them right so when
16:41 I come into a a company and we help identify those values if they haven’t done it yet then I then I do interviews
16:48 with all the staff and say tell me what you think the company values are because they’re the ones experiencing the
16:54 behavior right and if the behavior doesn’t match the value it’s not a value
16:59 right wow you know um so what I did in my own companies is I had leaders of all
17:05 my companies once a month we gathered together from other states and all and we would I would always ask them that
17:11 they knew I was going to ask first I ask what’s our mission you know what’s our vision right and what are our values and
17:17 then I then I went around the circle and said tell me what you learned tell me how you served tell me how you
17:24 collaborated right tell me how you gave right and they had to they knew I was
17:30 going to ask those questions every time we met so until you you can’t push them
17:35 through your company unless you’re living them first of all as a leader and then you’re constantly bringing accountability to the team underneath
17:42 you to live those out as well right and no I think maybe the most
17:52 impressive exemplification of their values yeah and then to take that the next step let’s talk about bu..building
17:59 teams because you ca..nobody’s 100% you I’m sure you’ve had to let people go or
18:06 it wasn’t a good fit so how did you take these values in your hiring process to
18:13 build those teams uh I think they’re critical I think most people don’t understand the how important values are
18:20 in the hiring process because values will either make or break your your culture and so to me values are
18:26 absolutely critical um I learned that the hard way by doing some bad hires at
18:32 the very beginning and I got uh what I learned is if if I somebody was willing
18:38 to learn they’re a learner that means they’re coachable right and I’m looking for those qualities of servanthood for
18:45 you know collaboration are they you can’t be on a team unless you’re collaborative right you have to show
18:50 that has to show up in your life um and the other piece are they giving are they
18:55 it doesn’t it’s not always about money are they giving of them elves right and to me those qualities and values are
19:03 really helpful in building a team and when I saw those values I was I was not
19:09 afraid to help train somebody a lot of times I match people with mentors to help them grow right because I’m not
19:15 because I I don’t I believe teaching them the skills is the easiest part for many people you
19:23 can’t teach people how to learn more they have to have that energy desire right they
19:29 have to have that motive and if they don’t have it it’s really hard to externally force it it’s not going to be
19:36 a good fit and they may be great people right but that’s just not the fit for
19:41 our organization and they need to maybe fit in another or organization that that could be a fit how how do you ascertain
19:48 if they are wired that way just curious it’s a great I so a long time ago I learned how to do behavioral interviews
19:54 and it’s one of the best skills I ever learned um so as you interview people uh you just keep driving down on behavior
20:01 right like like so you played soccer well tell me about how you played soccer
20:06 you know what position did you play uh tell me about what happens when you lost not only in you but what happened with
20:12 the team tell me how you exerted leadership in your team um what happened
20:18 when somebody tried to bully you um either on your team or the other team
20:23 right you can learn a lot about people just from it doesn’t have to be a business experience it’s a life
20:30 experience because that’s how we’re wired right it doesn’t matter if it’s at on the soccer field or whether it’s in
20:36 the office you’re going to typically react the same way so I’m I’m looking for how people behave because to me
20:43 behavior is the outward expression of your Inward and then yeah so so today
20:50 again working with transitions and succession plans that’s more succession than
20:56 transitions um how do you then again take this and and apply it to
21:03 teach others because in a in a in a succession yes I love my children but my
21:10 children are not necessarily me they are their own people right so how do you
21:16 help them well first of all um this is where
21:22 my background in psychology and sociology helps so first
21:27 of all I do a lot of assessment with everybody okay I want to know their strengths I want to know their conflict
21:33 styles I want to know their personalities I I give them a battery of about four to five different kind of
21:40 assessments so I try and get a fairly good holistic view of like who is this person how are they crafted how are they
21:46 wired and that helps me a lot to understand um how they may fit and
21:51 operate within the family right business and the family system as as well right
21:56 and and looking at their family history and then dynamics their birth orders there’s a lot to kind of think about um
22:04 so as as you approach it then you do interviews right you’re really get to try and get to know everybody the parents the kids uh key employees and
22:12 you get a pretty good framework about like how can I optimize this person right are they how can I optimize them
22:19 with the family business are they even going to be a good fit for the family business is that really what they want to do are they going to feel like
22:24 they’re kind of doing it out obligation I’ve had kids doing obligation and they can pull it off for
22:31 a while but they can’t sustain it right you know so how can they do it in a way
22:36 that can still be them because they might be on the board because there’s different levels right there’s ownership
22:42 right and then there’s leadership and then there’s management and so some kids
22:48 may just be owners uh some kids are going to be leaders and other kids are are going to
22:54 be you know maturely working within the business and it’s you need to make sure it’s okay for them to be at any level
23:01 yeah what’s the level that fits you best right and because we do so much succession also whether it’s placing
23:07 somebody in between to help mentor up um you know gen 2 or gen 3 or it’s it’s
23:15 let’s hire a general manager to run the day-to-day and the kids are right you
23:21 know in different different places in the business and we’ve always saw it as the passion that if you don’t have the
23:28 same passion and drive and goals as gen one or your previous
23:35 generation you know again it goes back to that misalignment and it’s that’s when we see
23:41 businesses fail right or suffer right yeah yeah and that’s why they call it
23:47 church sleeves the church sleeves in three generations right yeah yeah because the founder builds it the second generation often maintains it and the
23:54 third generation usually spends it yeah and uh so like yeah there has to be a lot of
24:00 intentionality and even with the best intentionality it’s still a bit of a crapshoot right cuz kids are kids and
24:06 they’re independent and they’re going to do their own thing and I I’d go over that with you know whoever the transition’s happening with we’re going
24:12 to we’re going to do a lot of work but it’s up to you you to continue to massage this and meet with the kids and
24:18 be proactive and intentional and do the best you can it’s going to give you your highest success rate if you just think
24:25 this planning alone is enough it’s never enough right right right yeah so it’s
24:31 interesting you know you’ve really covered a lot of ground since you probably left Seminary um if you look
24:40 back uh on the young man that you were at that time what advice would you give
24:46 him I would probably I thought about this I would probably say Focus follow one course until
24:52 successful you know I’m a little bit of a shiny I’m an activator right so I could start another company every day if
24:59 my wife would let me you know and so I it’s the ability to focus in and there’s
25:05 some there’s things I would even say in last one I even started this this journey uh I wish they it would have
25:11 done a couple things a little differently right I have very few regrets though um I’ve feel like I’ve
25:18 lived such a rich life between my family and an opportunity to do business and and because I’ve kind of had more of a
25:25 breath of scope though it’s given me kind of a very unique kind of a unicorn a little bit of the breadth of things
25:31 that I’ve been able that I’ve touched you know so I’ve done you know I’ve dors and family form had done over a thousand
25:37 divorces worked with families helped with family you know fights and and businesses helped with elder care wrote
25:43 a book you know and I feel like I’m not done yet right I still have some more books I want to write there’s still more i’ I’d love to do um we have probably
25:51 that focus a little more focus probably would have been helpful yeah you know I’m going to ask the same question but
25:57 gear it towards that business owner who’s thinking about
26:02 an exit plan what advice and strategy would you offer to them because again
26:08 you’ve yeah done it all um I think the biggest thing is to really make sure you
26:13 have a strategic plan and you follow that strategic plan and usually it’s helpful to have a consultant help you
26:19 you need somebody who’s outside to actually have peer inside it’s really hard to do all the valuation you need to
26:26 do uh inside um so having somebody from the outside come in and give you some
26:31 assistance and point out weaknesses and you need to sh up this you need to sh up that um because typically business
26:38 owners always overinflate the uh the ability and their worth of the company sometimes even
26:44 their personal worth and usually a consultant kind of helps to bring that humility back and helps them understand
26:50 if you really want to exit you need these are the things you really need to do well to do to do that they may think
26:58 they’ve been mentoring their kids well but from your perspective like it’s
27:03 there’s a gap right between what the the founder or the current leader thinks about where they’re at in the mentorship
27:09 of their children and where the kids think they’re at they’re wishing I need this I need that I’m not I don’t feel comfortable yet because that person
27:16 hasn’t given enough intentionality in the mentoring of that child yeah and
27:22 sometimes we’re brought in when you think a transition has happened mmhm and
27:27 yet it’s hard for the parent or or you know the founder to let go and then to
27:35 trust because again you identify who you are with what you do right and there’s
27:40 an ego piece to it right absolutely and it’s I find there I call it the passing the baton right so there’s two big
27:48 mistakes well there’s several but one of the bigger mistakes that happen with passing the baton is uh the founder will
27:54 throw it at the kid here I’m done you take it not enough mentorship not enough leadership development and they are
28:01 fumbling and they don’t want to fumble it they want to be successful but they haven’t really been trained to be
28:07 successful very well and the other one is the founder is just holding on right like I’m not going to let go you know
28:13 this is my baby you know and they really struggle to let to let go and oftentimes
28:19 the the a transitional leader is not a bad idea just like um just like in my
28:27 church world if a pastor’s been there like founding pastor been there 25 30 years and they they’re they’re retiring
28:33 or going on that next pastor is probably going to have a very short you know 10 year uh tenure tenure problem there
28:40 really going to be an interim and what they really needed to do is bring in an interim to help kind of re renegotiate
28:47 resettle re recalibrate and get get focused and I think the same can be true
28:53 for businesses from time to time they should bring in uh a CEO and that person maybe short term maybe longer term but I
28:59 think sometimes family businesses don’t give themselves permission it has to be a family member right well you actually
29:06 want the best leader possible to lead your business right and that may or may not be a family member absolutely so
29:14 Randy you know this podcast is called hiring for good and so we always end our
29:20 our questions with what does hiring for good mean to you to me it means again I’m going to go
29:27 back to values making sure you hire aligning your values and uh you rarely
29:34 have to let somebody go and if if you do the homework and
29:40 especially bring in the values I find that usually you have a lot of success
29:46 and you usually those are loyal key either and some of them become part
29:51 business partners with me and I’ve gone on to they’ve bought me bought me out now and like I’m uh here’s a great
29:57 example example I developed a web and marketing company I just wanted one to help new mediators I didn’t want I’m not
30:03 have any national aspirations with it I just wanted to help new mediators be able to navigate the social media world
30:09 and have decent websites so actually I hired she was 17 years old when I hired her right but she was a valedictorian she’s
30:16 sharp sharp lady and now she’s uh at the end of this year I’m giving her that
30:22 company and she’s going to spread her wings and she’s going to do great so to me that’s a great example of what it
30:28 means to hire and develop somebody and let them spread their wings that’s awesome that’s beautiful thank you so
30:34 much this was such a delight to have this conversation with you and um we uh
30:40 appreciate your time and hope you have a great day thank you for joining us on hiring for good oh thank you thank you Randy Dr Peace I love it thanks for
30:49 joining us today at hiring for good if you inspired by our conversation don’t forget to like follow and subscribe
30:56 wherever you get your podcast and if you want to learn more about our executive Search Services check us out at www.
31:03 hiringforgood.net or our company website Acumen Executive Search thanks
31:09 so much and don’t forget to join us next time for another in-depth conversation about transformational leadership till
31:15 then have fun